COVID-19 FAQ

You are entitled to paid sick leave if you are unable to work or telework due to a qualifying reason related to COVID-19. You must provide to your employer documentation in support of the reasons for your paid sick leave. These documents may include a copy of the Federal, State or local quarantine or isolation order related to COVID-19 or written documentation by a health care provider advising you to self-quarantine due to concerns related to COVID-19.

You must provide to your employer documentation in support of your expanded family and medical leave taken to care for your child whose school or place of care is closed, or child care provider is unavailable, due to COVID-19-related reasons. For example, this requirement may be satisfied with a notice of closure or unavailability from your child’s school, place of care, or child care provider, including a notice that may have been posted on a government, school, or day care website, published in a newspaper, or emailed to you from an employee or official of the school, place of care, or child care provider. Your employer must retain this notice or documentation in support of expanded family and medical leave, including while you may be taking unpaid leave that runs concurrently with paid sick leave if taken for the same reason.

Please also note that all existing certification requirements under the FMLA remain in effect if you are taking leave for one of the existing qualifying reasons under the FMLA. For example, if you are taking leave beyond the two weeks of emergency paid sick leave because your medical condition for COVID-19-related reasons rises to the level of a serious health condition, you must continue to provide medical certifications.

We’re hearing from a lot of landlords that tenants, anxious about jobs and businesses, are either asking for forgiveness from paying rent or are outright refusing to do so. Like many things in the law, this is a moving target based on the lease document and the governor’s various orders. The new executive orders do not directly provide commercial lease guidance, but they do speak to residential leases.

Call us before taking action with regarding to landlord-tenant issues. Here there be monsters!

The dispersal of the federal aid package is still a little fluid, but if you head to the SBA page for the Payroll Protection Plan, there are resources to help small businesses (under 500 people) make payroll and pay leases.